Business as usual

Davos should be a good place to focus minds on climate change.
For the business of this small Swiss town is winter sports, an
industry whose future looks less secure as Alpine snow becomes
less reliable. Among the ski slopes, the rich and powerful
have assembled for their annual get-together - the World
Economic Forum - with Tony Blair, Bill Gates and Bono among
their number. Appropriately, climate change has been the
dominant theme of the set-piece debates. Yet the real work, as
so often, is done behind closed doors. And the signs are that
this is focusing not on climate, but on trade.

Thirty ministers will today come together to try to break
the deadlock of the Doha trade round. Initiated during the
brief phase of international cooperation after 9/11, the
negotiations were billed as a "development agenda", in which
the west would focus on what it could give, not just what it
could get. The idea was overdue, when previous rounds had
liberalised only those industries in which the rich world was
strong. They had left untouched the protective walls shielding
sectors, such as farming, in which the developing world would
otherwise have had a chance to compete. The rules are so
rigged that Washington collects as much in tariffs on
Cambodian imports as it does from France, despite the goods
and services it buys from France being worth 15 times more.
But as the shock of 9/11 faded, enlightened self-interest gave
way to self-interest plain and simple. Five years into the
round, progress continues to be frustrated by a spat between
the US and the EU, with each using the intransigence of the
other as an excuse to avoid concessions on farm programmes.
Deadlines have come and gone, but now there is real pressure
to clinch a deal, because the waning power of the US
administration means that if it is not done now then the round
is dead - for the rest of the Bush presidency, if not longer.

A breakthrough would give the world economy a welcome
boost. And even if the rich stubbornly insisted on foisting
some liberalisation on the poor, developing countries would
see doors open to rich world markets, from which they have
been shut out for too long. A deal would represent
cooperation, proving that nations can give and take to meet
shared challenges - and that should give grounds for hope on
tackling climate change.

Yet in the gulf between the private talks on trade and the
public chatter on climate change, a more direct connection has
been lost. For the most immediate effects of Doha success
would be bad, not good, news for the climate. Trade
liberalisation will mean that more trade happens, which means
more goods being trekked round the world, stamping a heavy
carbon footprint. It could encourage deforestation: by opening
markets to farmers in places like Brazil, it would raise their
prices and so also their reward for clearing the jungle. And
by opening up supplies from parts of the world in which the
green agenda is not an issue, freer trade could even help the
market evade the bite of environmental regulation. Yet the
many gains from liberalisation need not be wholly sacrificed.
Rather, they should be pursued alongside - not ahead of -
further international agreement on climate change. But a trade
agenda that dismisses green concerns as "hidden protection"
shows how far political leaders remain from putting the
climate at the heart not just of their rhetoric, but of their
deeds.

On Friday the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
will present its sternest warning yet about the threat faced.
Yet, as the Guardian reveals today, instead of sitting up and
listening, the US is lobbying the panel to concentrate on
science-fiction solutions, such as putting giant mirrors into
space. Some politicians and corporations are waking up to the
challenge, but too many are still in their slumber. That has
been all too evident in Davos, where the business as usual
looks unusually worrying.